Kush! Fall Recruits Game

[UncleRhino]

Here is the link to the Rattrap forum with the updates I am doing for my Fall Recruits game of Broadsword Adventures.  Please forgive me for being so lazy as to not re-post everything here.  The convention is September 12-14th at Lee's Summit High School in Lee's Summit, Missouri.  I am not certain yet what timeslot the game will be running, but I will post an update here once I get things finalized.  I won't give out any more details, but there will be two other Rattrap games at the convention, one will be a Valley of the Thunder Lizard game hosted by Chuck and a Fantastic Worlds ((John Carter of Mars)) game hosted by Dan.  I don't have details on their games, and could not leak any more than I have already done without threat of horrible violence!

If there are any folks present here who will likely be in attending the convention that would like to join in on the game, send me a PM and I can save a spot in the game.  I can take four players.  Again, forgive my laziness!

http://rattrapproductions.com/speakeasy/viewtopic.php?t=1162

RWF

[Ironworker]

Here is the link to the Rattrap forum with the updates I am doing for my Fall Recruits game of Broadsword Adventures.  Please forgive me for being so lazy as to not re-post everything here.  The convention is September 12-14th at Lee's Summit High School in Lee's Summit, Missouri.  I am not certain yet what timeslot the game will be running, but I will post an update here once I get things finalized.  I won't give out any more details, but there will be two other Rattrap games at the convention, one will be a Valley of the Thunder Lizard game hosted by Chuck and a Fantastic Worlds ((John Carter of Mars)) game hosted by Dan.  I don't have details on their games, and could not leak any more than I have already done without threat of horrible violence!

If there are any folks present here who will likely be in attending the convention that would like to join in on the game, send me a PM and I can save a spot in the game.  I can take four players.  Again, forgive my laziness!

http://rattrapproductions.com/speakeasy/viewtopic.php?t=1162

RWF

We'll definately be looking for your table again! 

[BaronVonJ]

I'll be running some games at RECRUITS and will definitely stop by.
-J

[TredHed]

Cant wait to see the tables!

[UncleRhino]

You know, if you guys can't make it for some reason to the convention, let me know and we can always schedule a time to get together and I can run the game at my home or at one of the local game shops.

RWF

[UncleRhino]

Well, here are the finished product photos of the table itself. I made another three 2x2 squares to go together as a 4x4 if that sort of gaming need arises. If you look closely, you can see the two types of encounter markers I am using. The jungle terrain itself, is mounted on scrap cd's and mini-cd's, but there are other jungle-ish bits of terrain as well, those are encounter markers, and since the Stygians are looking for Black Lotus plants...well...there might be one in and among all of those.

Also note the encounter markers I made are just standard steel washers with the cat litter/white glue combo and the three green paint scheme I use on all of my stuff. But I added some resin skulls I had in my bits box, I figure in 28mm that an orc skull is pretty close to a gorilla skull...so why the hell not. I also figured I would make up a dozen of those and together with the eight I made for Spring Recruits with broken up bricks and rubble on them, I won't need to make any more encounter markers...ever. Until I get around to doing .45 Adventure city stuff...by the way, does anyone know of a company that makes manhole covers? I figure those would be ideal encounter markers for a city environ, even if they are potentially going to be all over the place.

Here are the pictures, tomorrow I have to finish off the escaped (and pissed off) slave faction and do a leeeeettle bit more typing on handouts for my own reference and I will be ready to go on Saturday.













The game is in the 1-4 and 5-10 Saturday slots if any of you are from nearby and want to check it out. If you ARE going to attend, send me a PM and we can work something out so you can give it a go. Also, if you DO NOT have Broadsword Adventures, Scale Creep (a vendor who carries the Rattrap lines) will be in attendance, let's see if we can get it sold out.

[Lordblackwing]

not to commit Threadomancy...but RAFM makes manhole covers in the Iron Lords  range. The ones with Chicago on them are part number 39010 01002. They also have a New York pack. Cost is about $7 for 6...at least from my local anyway.
Great looking boards. I wish I could make it, but no vacation time left for this year...maybe next year.

[Doomhippie]

Cool gaming table. I like the rather bleak sort of earth color. And due to the set-up of the fills and trees it looks very - complete somehow. Now what about some in game shots???

[Rhoderic]

I really like what you've done there, those colours seem very evocative of the jungle. How do you get figures to stand on the slopes?

Perhaps one suggestion: Clump the plants together a bit more in places. Currently they don't really seem like they'd get in the way much, when every individual piece of vegetation is easily circumvented.

[UncleRhino]

I could stage some in game shots and try and fool you, but I will get some on Saturday and post them as soon as I can.  As to models standing on slopes, some of the hills have magnetic sheets under the basing material that works a bit with the steel washer based models, the models on slotta bases do alright.  The texture of the basing material helps to keep models in place, too.

You know, Rhoderic, I thought to myself, damn, I need another dozen jungle stands...but I just don't know what I would do with that many otherwise.  I really don't have much of a use for this many, that many more would be a bit better, I agree.  It is not that they are hard to make, not at all, it is just that the con is tomorrow!

RWF

[UncleRhino]

Well, the car is packed and I am off to the con.  Hope to see some of you there, yes, even you European fellows should make a stop by, as I am eager to meet many of you.

NEWSFLASH

If you were planning on picking up BA or any of the Rattrap line from Scale Creep Miniatures, THEY WILL NOT be at the convention.

Pictures to come perhaps as early as tomorrow.

RWF

[UncleRhino]

Well, the game went over very well.  Despite pretty much the whole day in a fair amount of pain in my left foot, I had a great time running it.  People seemed to enjoy themselves a great bit, and I was actually told that it had many of the elements that make Howard's stories great.

The lousy part is I had typed out a detailed review of the whole thing yesterday morning with pictures inserted and everything...and the power flickered and it all got lost.  I guess I need to have a ten minute rule with posts, just go ahead and post them every ten minutes and go back and edit them so I don't have to be that pissed off ever again.

I will get it typed out in the next day or two and post pictures and more details of the game and how both sessions went.

RWF

[Doomhippie]

I hate it when that happens! Still, I'm looking forward to some cool pics and a report. It's always an inspiration to look at gaming pictures and read some cool story.

[BaronVonJ]

Saw you / Met you at RECRUITS. Game looked great. I couldn't stay to watch, but looked like it was gonna be fun. I'lll conatct you off line.
-J

[UncleRhino]

Ok, here goes attempt number two at a convention report!

Faction One were the Escaped Slaves.  Two models in this faction, a Major Noble and a Barbarian Hero.  Duke Theletes of Argos( who is actually a duke, but also a pirate) and his Aesir bodyguard Brodir.  Since this faction had no sorcery, I made them fairly well rounded as far as character design, but also made sure they would be very tough in melee combat.  The duke is a Master of Arms 2 and Brodir could Ignore Pain and have Flurry of Blows 1(so he got two attacks per melee).  Having just a few hours ago escaped from the slavers during a raid by damn near a whole tribe of Kushites, the Duke, Brodir and Elyssa(the duke's favorite slave girl, a comely Brythunian wench) made a run for it during the raid by the natives.  In true pulp fashion, she fell behind and was lost in the jungle.  Not wanting to leave her to either the slavers or the natives, Theletes and Brodir rush back to find her.  Their victory condition was to find Elyssa and escort her off of their starting table edge.

Faction Two were the Slavers.  Three models in this faction, Ibrahim bin Suleiman and two Grade One Warriors.  I was not really sure if they were better represented by city dwellers or barbarians, so I went with barbarians since these were nomads from Shem.  Ibrahim was a defensive nightmare with a shield, long blade and Stalwart Defender, and the other two both had long blades and shields as well, since they had no sorcery and only Ibrahim was higher than Grade One, I made sure to make them all be fairly well equipped.  Their victory condition was to recapture Elyssa and/or the Duke, if they got one of the two, it was a minor victory, if both it would be a major victory.  There was absolutely no necessity in capturing Brodir, because Northman thugs are a dime a dozen and their blades can be bought cheaply.  He would not have good resale value after they took out their frustrations on him for their trouble.

Faction Three were the Kushites.  Four models in this faction, lead by a M'bura(Witchdoctor), Ghol'mi(Smoke Warrior) and because they were savages, for each grade 2 or 3 model you have on a faction, you get a free grade 1!!!  I decided this would be a fine way to represent how the Kushites would outnumber the others and also give them a bit of a home field advantage.  M'bura wore a Demon Mask, had a sleeping dart and his spell was Spirit Ancestor.  Ghol'mi had Brawler 2, Fearless, Ignore Pain and a couple of other skills designed to make him a real beast in melee.  Ghomli is an ambitious man, a man who has slain a lion with his bare hands, and looking to make a name for himself...  The "free" savages were warriors with shields, spears and rush attack,which quickly became known as the "drive by attack".  The goal of this faction is to drive away the interlopers from Gullah's holy place, to do so, they must kill or drive off half or more of EACH of the other three factions in play.  Kind of steep, but they did wind up with four models(seven grades!!!!!), so they were more than up to the task.

Faction Four were the Stygians.  Consisting of a High Priestess of Set and two Initiates, these three models were there looking for Black Lotus!  The high priestess was draped with vipers, carried night dust, a blood bllade and amulet of Set(Mok), Savvy(which despite her BRAINS of 6, she was never able to use successfully) and despite the fact that I am not a big fan of the spell, Wall of Fire.  The initiates were true religions fanatics and were armed with maces.  They had Undying Loyalty, Devotion and Boundless Will.  Basically, they were there to keep the priestess safe, and she was there for the Black Lotus, even if she had to sacrifice both of them to find it.  Their victory conditions were to find as much Black Lotus as they could and escape with it from their starting spot. 

The Game Overall:

Encounter Markers.  There were 27 encounter markers and I had two different sorts. There were 12 steel washers with skulls scattered about the 4x4 playing area.  I also had 15 bits of aquarium vegetation mounted on poker chips that I bought from ebay before I made my cd mounted jungle stands, I referred to these as the Stationary Encounter markers.  Three of the Stationary Encounter markers were Black Lotus, when a model was in base to base contact with one of these, they had to make a WILLPOWER test(plus their Grade level if they were in the Stygian Faction) or succumb to the effects of the plant.  The effect was that they would lose a turn and have strange visions that were made up on the fly by yours truly.  I think some folks saw great battles from the past, grisly visions of Gullah, the hairy ape god who lives in the moon, the rise and fall of empires past and present and all that sort of thing.  If a model failed its WILLPOWER test and lost a turn it did gain some form of insight into things to come and was rewarded with a HERO POINT.  If a model passed the WILLPOWER test, it could gather up some of the Black Lotus safely and carry it away.  I decided that any of the factions could do this, however, but none other than the Stygians collected any.  Elyssa was a triggered encounter, one of the Stationary Encounters and one of the Encouters had to be both found for her to appear on the table, she was controlled by me and generally shrieked and ran about looking buxom and needing to be rescued.  It was decided that she could not be attacked, but that she could be captured by any of the factions OR rescued by the Duke and Brodir.  Two other two-part triggered encounters were The Drums and a Downpour.  When the first of those two types of encounters was revealed, the condition would begin and remain in play until the second was found.  The Drums were the standard Howardian Kushite/African ones that generally bothered and upset non-Kushites but gave some sort of advantage to the Kushites, in the end I decided that while The Drums were playing, the Kushites would have a +1 GUTS bonus.  Downpour was just simply that, it rained and rained hard, during this ongoing condition, anyone making a DODGE test for any reason had to roll two dice and keep the lower of the two, visibility was also reduced to 24".  The Drums and Downpour were in effect for almost the entirety of the first game and came on and off quickly in the second game. 

The Child of Gullah was the last two-part triggered encounter.  In both sorts of encounters there was some kind of ominous sign that something large and hostile was lurking nearby, and when both encounters were revealed, the Child of Gullah would appear.  Basically, a Gorilla with a nasty attitude, it would attack the nearest model and give me something to fight with as well.  M'bura carried with him a Black Painted Skull which he could offer to the Child of Gullah as a sacrifice, if he did this, he had to win a WILLPOWER test against it to have control of it for a short time, 2-3 turns. 

The Traitor:  Ghomli is an ambitious man, a very powerful warrior who has slain a lion bare-handed.  He also wants to rise to the positin of Tribal Chieftain, he can do this if he is able to show that he is stronger than Gullah's Child by defeating it in melee combat.  Once that is done, he has only to kill M'bura and return with the head of the Child of Gullah to his tribe and oust the existing chieftain.  Basically, once the Child of Gullah appears in the game, the Kushite player had to give me the Ghomli character card and he would get the Child of Gullah card--as long as it was under his control!  From that point on, Ghomli would be played by me (hooray, I get to play) and the Child of Gullah would be under the control of the Kushite player as long as he could maintain control. 

Well....that is basically the meat and bones of the game itself, i will post photos and talk more about how both of the games played at RECRUITS were very different from one another this evening when I return from work.  Don't you just love a cliffhanger?

RWF